1. Iteration Efficiency and Thinking Ahead
Skilled engineers build products in significantly fewer iterations with AI because they can anticipate outcomes, whereas less skilled developers rely on vibe coding.
Hear it at 0:00 →Engineering video
0:45 · 19 September 2026
Same AI. Why Experienced Developers Get Better Results
Key concepts in this video:
2. Fundamentals, System Design, and End-to-End Expectations
Developers need a combination of low-level fundamentals and high-level system design, as companies currently expect engineers to operate end-to-end.
Hear it at 0:15 →Transcript
So the difference between a skilled engineer and a very less skilled engineer, with AI is that they can both build a thing, but the engineer that's skilled will build it in a lot less iterations. Their first version would be as good as the 10th version of someone that's just vibe coding. And that's because they can think ahead. Now, for that, you need both low-level thinking, which is fundamentals, right? Understanding how components are built, how do you manage state, and high-level system design.
Like scalability, where do we deploy it? What the database we will use? How do we start? So, I think you need both, right? It's just a lot of developers spend a lot of time coding, so they probably feel like the biggest gap is system design. But again, you cannot have 15 people doing architecture in a company. Somebody will have to build features. So what companies expect right now is that you are end-to-end.